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African American Homeownership Lacking Southeastern Michigan

Further examination of the percentage of African American homeowners in Southeastern Michigan in 2016 confirms that the City of Detroit had among the highest percentages in the region. However, it was the City of Highland Park that had the highest percentage of African American homeowners in 2016 at about 96 percent. In total there were 13 municipalities in the Southeastern Michigan with African American homeownership above 50 percent. The percentage of African American homeowners in Detroit in 2016 was 53 percent. As the map below shows, the concentration of African American homeowners in Southeastern Michigan is located in the Detroit inner-ring suburbs. The City of Pontiac, which has about a 52 percent homeownership rate, was the only City outside the inner-ring with African American homeownership above 50 percent. Additionally, aside from a few pockets in Wayne, Oakland and Macomb counties, African American homeownership did not rise above about 13 percent in majority of the region. In total, there were 41 municipalities in Southeastern Michigan where African American homeownership was at 0 percent in 2016. Many of the municipalities with 0 percent African American homeownership have small African American populations, according to Census data.

As noted in the previous post, the lack of African American homeownership in Southeastern Michigan can be attributed to the Great Recession, which brought on higher rates of unemployment and foreclosures. However, it can also be argued that the low percentage of African American homeownership in the outskirts of Southeastern Michigan can be attributed to the large scale migration of Caucasian individuals from Detroit to its suburbs in the 1950s and 1960s; this trend is also commonly referred to as white flight.